A visual ethnography of an urban neighborhood

Atlanta is the fourth fastest gentrifying city in the United States, and a group of five neighborhoods is the subject for this visual ethnography. A problem list was derived from a qualitative study of 20 resident leaders/stakeholders which highlighted problems associated with important representative structures in the community. A visual representation is a way of “seeing, knowing and showing” their spoken and visual culture. This study is a snapshot of a community during a time of rapid change, and illustrated how residents reframed neighborhood deficit discourse as they knew that “change was coming.” This ethnography also described transformative strategies and how stakeholder and community activism bridged different social networks.